Page 75 of The VIP Doubles Down

“Because I’m driving, and I don’t want to mess with those.”

“I’m perfectly capable of driving,” he said. “I only stagger a bit.”

“Which means that if the police stop you and tell you to walk the line, you’ll be in big trouble.”

He pushed away from the Bentley, positioned himself on a line of bricks that ran straight across the floor, and focused his gaze downward as he put one foot directly in front of the other. When he reached the far wall, he threw her a look of triumph. “Straight as an arrow with nary a wobble.”

“I’m still driving.” Although it made her nervous to think about the perils of crazy cab drivers coming near such an expensive vehicle.

“Can you handle a manual transmission?”

“I can handle a tractor pulling a chisel plow.”

“If I ever need a field tilled, I’ll make sure to call you.” He tapped in a string of characters on a keypad, causing a panel to slide back and reveal a dozen sets of keys hung in neat rows. He unhooked a set, and the panel slid closed.

“What are the extra keys for?”

“The cars out at my Southampton house,” he said, weaving slightly as he walked to the low-slung black Maserati. He held open the driver’s door for her and offered her the keys.

Allie shook her head in amazement as she got in the car. Sometimes she just plain forgot how rich he was. Maybe that was a good thing.

Her nerves ratcheted up another notch as she surveyed the array of dials and digital readouts on the high-end control panel. Gavin dropped into the passenger seat and pointed out the basics for her. She took a deep breath and punched the ignition. The car’s big engine purred to life. She shifted into low and eased forward as Gavin pushed a button that lifted the garage door. Once out on the street, she tested the feel of the steering and the gearshift, finding both to be responsive and silky. “I could get used to this,” she said, doing a smooth shift.

“Borrow it anytime you like.”

“Ha! I wouldn’t even know where to get gas for it.”

Gavin was quiet on the ride downtown to her apartment, and she let him be, since she needed to concentrate on keeping the Maserati’s paint unmarred. Her body hummed with satisfaction, both from the sex and from knowing she had gotten him away from the bourbon bottle.

She’d never succeeded in doing that with Troy. Once her ex-husband started drinking to dull the sting of yet another rejection, nothing she did could stop him until he passed out. It reassured her to find out that Gavin didn’t climb into a liquor bottle and drown there.

She sneaked a quick glance at the man sitting beside her. His profile was washed by the multicolored city lights, but she couldn’t discern any emotion in it. He was a complicated man, and he generated a whole mix of feelings in her, some positive, some less so.

What was with her and creative types? Troy the actor. Gavin the writer. Why couldn’t she be attracted to a nice, stable accountant every now and then?

Her earlier thought about love popped into her brain, but she brushed it away as an overreaction.

She maneuvered the car into a parking spot half a block from her building and turned off the engine with a sigh of relief.

“Thank you,” he said.

“For?”

“Taking me in tonight.”

With those words he had her in his power again. He could have stayed in the presidential suite in any hotel in the city, yet he felt grateful for her tiny apartment with its four-story climb and water-stained ceilings.

“I couldn’t leave you to sleep in your car,” she said. “Any of them.”

His laugh sounded rusty, but it was another laugh. He came around to hold the door she had already pushed open. As she stood, he draped one arm around her shoulders and scanned the streetscape. “Sometimes I wish ...” He turned them toward Allie’s building.

“That you hadn’t made gazillions of dollars so you still lived in a place like this?” Allie asked. “That you’d never gotten a Julian Best book published, much less sold millions of copies and made movies out of them?”

“When you put it like that—” He shook his head. “I don’t know what I wish.”

“You wish for what we all do. All the good and none of the bad.” Allie pulled her keys out and shoved one into the scratched-up lock.

Gavin pushed open the door, and the reek of someone’s dinner cooked hours earlier smacked her in the nose. “Seriously, would you really want to live here again?” she asked.